The present invention relates to the provision of video mail and/or messages in a telecommunications system and, more particular to the playback and the playback-control of the video mail and/or messages from a cellular handset receiver.
Receiving and reviewing voicemail can be a cumbersome process, especially in a business setting or other situation where a substantial amount of voice mail is received. One of the complications arises in that the voicemail messages are serially recorded and during the playback, if a portion of the message is missed, the user needs to back-up to re-listen to the message. Portions of a voicemail message may require repeated review to capture the actual message. This can be due to a variety of reasons including, but not limited to, background noises, poor pronunciation, rapid talking, and garbled audio due to interference in the transmitting, receiving or playback technologies. Using older technology, a user's only option was to restart the playback of the voicemail message. This technique is inadequate in that the user is required to replay the entire message even though only a small portion of the voicemail message may need to be repeated
A technique that has been introduced to the market for voicemail messages is a rewind-like capability. This technique allows the user to press a button, such as a key on a telephone keypad, to rewind the message for a duration the of playback time. For instance, pressing the [3] key will rewind a message 6 seconds and then resume playback from that point. Additional rewinding can be obtained by pressing the key repeatedly. This technique provides some improvement in the art by allowing a user to “go back” in the playback of a message to re-listen to a missed portion of the message. However, this technique still lacks much needed capabilities in the ability to review and playback voicemail messages as will be further described.
With the introduction of video messaging and video mail into telecommunications systems, the complexities associated with the playback of messages are even more so exaggerated. One of the reasons that the complexities are exaggerated is that the volume of data included in a video message is substantially greater than a voicemail message. Thus, to rewind the playback of a video message, a significant amount of data must either be buffered at the playback end or retransmitted by the source end. Thus, there is a need in the art for a solution that enables flexibility in the playback of video messages but that is not over burdensome on bandwidth or memory storage requirements.
Another complexity with providing flexibility in the playback of video messages is maintaining synchronization of the video and the audio content. If this content is stored separately, the complexities associated with flexible playback can be significant.
Another complexity with providing flexibility in the playback of video messages is that not only may a user need to re-listen to audio content that may have been missed, but the user may actually need to review the video content, pause the video content to take notes, or search the video message for a particular portion of the video and/or audio content. Current techniques available in the market do not provide the flexibility needed to meet these needs.
Thus, there is a need in the art for a solution that allows a user a wide range of flexibility in the playback and review of video messages. Within the cellular telecommunications environment where bandwidth is a premium, such a solution needs to provide this flexibility in a bandwidth efficient manner. These and other needs in the art are addressed by the present invention described herein.